


Repairs

by Bullfinch



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-04-22
Packaged: 2018-10-22 14:34:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10699020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bullfinch/pseuds/Bullfinch
Summary: When next they meet Hanzo is trying to kill Genji again.





	Repairs

Genji only has the sword at hand because he's about to put it in his bag, and it's only because he's so jumpy that he grabs it off the bed when his apartment door clicks open.

But it's only Hanzo entering the loft, the bookshelf on the wall casting a slanting shadow over his face. Genji throws the sword down again and stacks his shirts together. "Hanzo. I wasn't expecting you."

"No, I imagine not." Lightning flashes outside the windows, and thunder follows a second later, rumbling through the night. Hanzo's jaw is set, his eyes resting on the floor.

Genji looks up with a grimace. Rain lashes the rusty skylight, rattling on the glass. Not a good time to be flying. He hopes the flight isn't cancelled. "Sorry, but I have to go soon. We can talk tomorrow. I'll call you." 

"Where are you going?" Hanzo asks.

Genji shoves the shirts in his bag. "Up to Sapporo. There's a party tomorrow night. I think I can make some good money."

"Hm," Hanzo muses. "That's quite a large bag for one party."

Damn. Hanzo's always been the smart one. Genji spots something he didn't notice before. A wrapped hilt jutting up over Hanzo's right shoulder. Why did he bring that? "Fine," Genji snaps. "I'm leaving Hanamura. I can't stay here any longer. Not with _them._  I'm not going to be treated that way anymore." He rolls up a pair of pants and jams them in behind the shirts.

"I...can understand that," Hanzo says. "What I don't understand is why you felt the need to steal _thirty million yen_ from the clan—from _your own family—_ before you left."

Genji lurches to a halt. His stomach curdles around a frozen knot of fear. _How did he know?_  Genji looks up—and finds Hanzo's gaze locked pointedly on the black briefcase half-tucked under his bag.

Another flash of lightning blazes through the skylight. Genji flings his hand up. "Do you think they won't make this back by summer?! I've done nothing to them! Maybe I should have."

"You stole from your family, Genji! You call that _nothing?"_

"Of course I do! The elders have hated me since I was a child. Why should I care anything for them? Or their money?" Genji spits, rolling up another pair of trousers.

The faintest scrape of metal. Genji looks up.

Hanzo's sword is drawn. It trembles a little, the pristine blade gleaming. 

Genji stares. He can't understand this. Can't understand what's happening here, in his loft with this year's fashion posters on the walls, hacked-up training dummies by the windows, clothes strewn wherever he tossed them at four in the morning and never bothered to pick them up. Hanzo standing by the door with his sword drawn. "Brother—" he tries. "Wh...what are you doing?"

"Genji..." Hanzo doesn't look angry. He did a second ago but he doesn't now. "I hardly recognize you anymore." 

 "What do you mean you don't recognize me?!" Genji backs away. "I'm your brother!"

"No you're not." Hanzo takes a stuttered step forward. "You have stolen from your own blood. A Shimada would never do such a thing."

"Please." Genji shakes his head, trying to think of what to say. How to bridge the gulf opening up at his feet. Or at least how to climb out of it. "Don't hurt me. I just want to leave. I need to leave."

"Thirty million yen, Genji!" Hanzo barks. "From your own family! Years of disrespecting them and now— _this—"_

Anger pierces the murk of confusion, bright like the reflection of light on Hanzo's blade-edge. "Why would I show them respect?!" Genji shouts. "They never showed me any! Not since I—"

"You never gave them a _chance,_  Genji!" Hanzo shouts back, desperate. "If you had, they would have give you one as well! You _chose_  this!"

Genji stares back and can't find anything to say. How could Hanzo—who's always been there for him, always, no matter what the elders said—how could he think these things? The hurt is tight in his chest. If he doesn't have Hanzo then who—then who—

He only snatches up the sword to defend himself, raising it across his body, Hanzo's weapon slicing the sheath and striking the blade within. The hilt vibrates in Genji's hand.

That won't dull it. These are the swords built for them when they were both children, made of the same gleaming metal, some neo-Damascene alloy that's both light and impervious to nicks or scratches. 

But Hanzo's blade is longer and infinitely sharper, nano-honed to an edge that parts flesh and bone like gelatin. Genji has seen some of the elders use just such a blade to punish those who have offended them. The sliced ends of fingers or hands or ears could have been drawn from an anatomy book. 

And now that same edge is aimed at his own throat.

The best choice is to run. Hanzo is the better swordsman, has always been, because Genji wasn't given as many lessons, of course. And the ones his father found for him were with experts but not masters, lower-level teachers who wouldn't arouse the wrath of the elders. So he shouts out "Open windows!" as he dives across the bed, and the windows scrape up on their tracks.

Hanzo is coming. Genji darts around the training dummy and scrambles through the gap onto the rooftop just below. 

Rain fills the air around him, lashing his face. A little bit of distance. He's smaller than Hanzo. The wall ahead is splashed with a pop mural in pink and green, and Genji sprints for it, splashing through puddles, shoving his sword through his belt. He leaps for the wall, clambering—the material is old and pocked, and the wet surface is slippery but he finds some handholds, little cracks inside a tiger's neon stripes, his toes scraping at a pair of painted pouting lips. Once he nearly falls back to the ground, but with a final, desperate effort, he extends and grasps the edge of the roof with one hand. Then he heaves himself up and stumbles to his feet.

The wet slap of a palm on rain-soaked cement. Genji spins—a stupid idea, he should have kept running.  

Hanzo is there. He attacks, a sweeping arc that Genji barely blocks in time, whipping the sword from his belt. Again the hilt rings in his hands, the sheath sliced through. "Hanzo, please!" Genji backs up, the sheathed blade still raised. "I'm sorry! Whatever I did, I'm sorry!"

"Save your apology." Hanzo strides across the rooftop, face shining with rain, water splashing up around his boots. "Your actions speak for you."

The gleaming sword darts through the air. Genji ducks, reaching back, knowing there's a wall behind him. There, his fingers scraping the porous surface.

Hanzo stabs. Genji heaves himself to the side, his hip banging into a flowerbox, little pink blooms drooping in a pond of muddy soil.

Hanzo's sword is sunk halfway into the cement. Not that that will dull it. Not the super-strong steel, not the nano-honed edge. Hanzo's grip tightens, his shoulders tensing. He tears the blade free.

Genji runs.

A gap before the next roof, and he pumps his legs, hurling himself through the air, makes the landing and rolls—coming down hard on his shoulder. But he's on his feet again. Hanzo is already there, of course, because he's faster and his legs are longer. Genji raises his sword to block, an involuntary whine of fear bursting out of him. The jarring of the hilt nearly makes his grip spring open.

This time Hanzo's sword drags the sheath off, and Genji's blade is naked to the pouring rain. "No, Hanzo!" He shakes his head, frantic, parrying again—nearly missing the second strike, and he feels the cold metal open up a thin cut on his cheek. "Hanzo, please, I don't want to fight you!"

"You have chosen already!" Hanzo shouts, a rain-drenched lock of hair sticking to his forehead. "You turned your back on your family! That means you turned your back on me!"

"Hanzo, I would never do that!" A resonant _clang_ as their swords clash together. "You're my brother! I love you!"

"Stop _saying_  that!" Hanzo roars, and his blade gleams in a flash of lightning. The crack of thunder is like a gunshot in the night, and it makes Genji flinch as he tries to block. 

The scrape of steel. A deep, sharp pain in his wrist. Genji looks down. He only feels one hand on the sword hilt. Did he let it go?

There's something on the ground, curled up on the wet crystalcrete, collecting rain. Where did that...

His severed hand.

Genji screams.

Hanzo flinches, frozen. Genji turns and runs, the sword still dangling from his grip. As he goes he raises his left hand—what used to be his left hand but it isn't there, it's only a sheared-off stump. A perfect cross-section of bone and muscle. It should hurt more, he feels. But it just throbs. As he watches blood begins to pulse out of it, dripping from the cut skin and running down his forearm. 

Then he's not looking where he's going so the roof disappears from under him, and he falls eight or nine feet and tries to catch himself but only manages to jam his stump into the hard surface. He makes a high, keening noise and staggers to his feet, snatching up the fallen sword on his way. Dim light up ahead from a latticed skylight. He tries to run but it's hard to coordinate his legs. His hand is gone. Hanzo cut off his hand and it's gone. 

A gust of wind sends him stumbling sideways, smacked by a sheet of rain. The faint splash of footsteps behind him. Genji spins and almost falls down, bringing the sword up. Terrible positioning, and the strike knocks the blade out of his hand. He trips and falls to the ground, cowering, raising his arms to stop the killing blow as he screams out a frantic _"Don't!"_

Sharp, bright pain. Something falls onto his leg and rolls to the glistening crystalcrete. His eyes track it. 

It's his arm, sliced off just below the elbow.

Genji bursts into tears. Fear, pain, the animal mixture stoking to a frenzy inside him. But glowing in the center is the unthinkable truth of it. Hanzo did this. Hanzo cut off both his hands. Hanzo wants to kill him. What did he do wrong? What did he do to make his brother so angry at him? He drags himself back on his elbows, knowing there's no point. He can't defend himself anymore. He has no hands. His weapon lies beside him, useless.

Hanzo stands frozen. A flash of lightning illuminates the rainwater dripping off the tip of his nose, the sheen of red on his blade. 

Genji flips over and crawls. 

The skylight. The lattice is familiar—it's his own skylight. He's right above his apartment. His phone is still on the bed. Maybe if he can make a call—if the police get here they can save him—

He drags himself forward. The old, grey glue crusts at the edges of the rusted lattice like mold. As he crawls blood smears on the glass. The wide pane creaks beneath him, and he brings an elbow down, hears the fine _crack_. Just needs a hole big enough to crawl through. Brings his elbow down again—

The entire pane shatters and Genji falls, grabbing desperately—hooking his mostly-intact arm over the lattice bar, but the metal is thin and brittle and old and it snaps under his weight, shattering another pane of glass. Genji plummets, landing hard on his back with a cry. 

The sky glitters above him.

Shards of glass rain down from thirty feet above. Genji raises his arms, his mutilated arms, to protect himself. It isn't enough. A dozen blossoms of sharp pain in his gut, his legs. He cries out again, squeezing tears from his eyes. A shout from above him. _"Genji!"_

He tries to raise his head. A shard of glass points straight up at the broken skylight, buried in his stomach. There are others around it, smaller, jagged, nested in his shredded gut. He reaches down to pull it out but has no hands to do it with. Instead his wrist-stump smears blood on the grimy surface. 

A shadow falls across him. Hanzo stands tall and dark with his back to the moon above. Lightning crashes and in the flash his face shines with rain. 

Genji tries to beg for his life, coughs and gurgles and weakly spits out a glut of blood that spills warm over his chin. _"Hanzo, I'm sorry!"_ The words tearing out of him like the glass tears up his body with each tiny movement he makes. _"I love you and I always looked up to you!"_

Hanzo heaves the blade high and plunges it down into Genji's stomach. 

He screams, blood bubbling in his throat, gasps in breath and screams again. It hurts. His body hurts, a white-hot agony spreading through his nerves like electricity through a million fine circuits. Why such cruelty? Why didn't Hanzo plunge the blade through Genji's heart instead? Then it would have been over and he wouldn't have to feel—feel as if he's being ribboned apart slowly, his body—once strong and quick—now a disorganized mess of muscle and organs and destroyed tissue attached to his tormented brain. A disgusting, disgraceful end.

The elders would be happy.

Genji is waiting for Hanzo to pull the sword out and then realizes it's not going to happen because Hanzo is gone. He's alone in his apartment, the nanohoned blade still sticking out of his middle. He can't pull it out himself. His hands have been cut off. 

He stares through the shattered skylight, at the unsettled grey clouds moving in. Rain spatters onto his face. There's a wisp of green at the edge of his vision. The pain abates a little, somehow. 

"Hello?"

A woman's voice, speaking English. That's his phone, lying on the bed behind him. How? He didn't call anyone.

"Hello? Who is this?" Faintly accented. European? "How did you get this number?"

Genji opens his mouth. His throat works against the blood. "H-help—me—"

No reply. A  _click_ as the line goes dead _._

His eyelids start to drift shut. He feels cold. A blurry coil of green loops around itself above him, and then there's a little well of heat in his chest.

He closes his eyes. 

——

Genji knows the archer as soon as the arrow punches through his chest.

He's heard the rumors, of course. Has seen the hazy images from poorly maintained security cameras, the familiar heavy brow, the set of the jaw. And the bow, seen only in glimpses. Hanzo always liked archery, but the elders pushed him to swordsmanship instead. Genji hated it, of course. But they wouldn't let him focus on his blade.

Genji tries to run but the explosive rounds those security guards got him with earlier did their job and his left knee won't stay braced beneath him, swinging loose and useless. The right leg falters, unstable; blackened wires and shreds of synthetic muscle protrude from the blast hole in his thigh. The mission was supposed to be simple, but explosive rounds and what Genji has to imagine is an expensive archer-for-hire mean there's something else hidden in that warehouse that the owners really don't want found. And Genji won't find it now. He's running, or trying to. Had hoped that all the way out here, where the floodlights don't quite reach, he might have some cover.

Another arrow pierces his chest, and there's a flare of heat as it destroys one of the battery rods. The third arrow lances straight through his shoulder, the X-bladed head severing the joint strut. Genji grits his teeth under the mask as his arm swings free. He drags himself forward, trying to make the wall. It's so close. Ten yards through the dark, if he could just reach it—

The next arrow takes him in the lower back. The head sticks inside his middle and then detonates.

Genji collapses, pressing his forehead to the damp asphalt. It isn't _painful,_ really, not with this body, but he can sense that a number of things have been destroyed. Battery rods, wires—signals to his lower extremities switched to the wireless backup, slower and not as responsive. The power restriction he feels as weakness, his limbs heavy, his head hard to raise. 

He's going to die. By Hanzo's hand. Again.

He supposes six years beyond his first death was far more than he could have expected, in this unnatural body. His toes scrape on the asphalt as he tries to push himself forward and fails. It won't be long. Even now Hanzo will be coming to inspect him, to find his hard drive and transmitter to destroy the data he stole and his ability to call in help.

Genji's eyes drift up. Dark clouds slide predatory across the night sky, consuming the stars, little pinpoints of light lost into blackness. There are footsteps approaching. Slow, controlled. A murmur, terribly familiar. "There is no need. I'll take care of it."

Genji's artificial vision sharpens, peering through shadows, reinforcing the ambient light. Hanzo. Genji's chest cannot tighten and he has no breath that would catch in his throat, but his eyes, his organic eyes, start to prick. The same as ever—the slight hook in the nose, the thin, focused frown. An exquisite bow is slung over his back. He comes to a halt, rolling the shaft of an arrow in his fingertips. The X-shaped head glitters.

"Brother, please," Genji whispers.

The arrow stops.

Genji shuts his eyes. He had not meant to say that. Better to simply pass on as he should have six years ago than to have Hanzo see him like...this.

"You cannot..."

Hardly a breath, bitten back quickly. Genji curls up and waits, hoping Hanzo will ignore it, will go ahead and finish the job and never think twice about what's behind this mask—

"Genji?"

But apparently it is not to be. Reluctantly Genji retracts the mask, his gaze still fixed on his twitching, useless hand lying on the ground. But Hanzo kneels and cups his face, tilting it up until their eyes meet.

Not quite the same. The sides of his head are shaved, and a bridge piercing gleams between his eyes. Genji almost smiles. He's not the only one who's changed since they last met. 

"Genji, I thought you were—" Hanzo scans him up and down, brow creasing. 

"I was," Genji answers. "I should have been. I...I don't know why I lived."

Hanzo is silent a moment more, thoughtful. Maybe he'll finish it after all and Genji won't have to deal with—this—

"How did you get here?" Hanzo asks suddenly.

Genji hesitates. "A...a bike. In the woods past the wall."

"Hm." Hanzo sets his bow and quiver down, grabs the arrow sticking out of Genji's lower back, and yanks. 

It comes out fairly easily, since the head exploded. Then Hanzo rolls Genji on his side and yanks out the others through the front, one after another. When the feathered fletchings appear they've got bits of lubricant and charred machine flecks stuck on them. "I apologize," Hanzo says. "Did that hurt you?"

"No, actually," Genji tells him.

"That is good." Then Hanzo grabs Genji's destroyed body by the arm and leg and hauls it over his shoulders.

Genji finds his cheek pressed to the back of a sleek, functional charcoal-gray jacket. "Hanzo—what are you doing?!"

"Breaking my contract." Hanzo sticks his arm through the bow and quiver-strap and rises with effort, gripping Genji's limbs tightly. He grunts, staggering. "You're—quite heavy."

"I'm made of metal," Genji snaps. "Put me down."

"No." Hanzo makes his way toward the wall with careful steps.

"Put me _down!_ If they spot us, they'll be shooting at you too! I suspect you are much more vulnerable to explosive rounds than I!" Genji tries to struggle, his limbs shifting weakly.

Hanzo weaves sideways. "Stop— _wriggling!"_

"I'll stop when you let me go!" Genji retorts. Hanzo, of course, does no such thing. Instead he marches doggedly on. The wall stretches high above them, smooth and sheer. Genji peers up. He was able to climb it only because of the blades in his toes, the nanofiber in his fingertips. So how is Hanzo...

Hanzo slides the bow and quiver down his arm. "Hold onto me for a moment."

"No."

"Genji!"

"No! Put me down!"

"Do you want us both to get caught?! Hold onto me!"

Genji growls, exasperated, and holds on. Hanzo lets go and chooses an arrow from the quiver, leans back—one foot braced behind him so he doesn't topple with Genji's weight—and draws the bow.

The arrow flies up, the head burying itself just below the top of the wall. A silvery line tumbles down, hanging a meter off the ground. Hanzo chuckles. "It's a good thing this wall isn't a little taller. Then we'd be stuck."

Genji can't quite believe what he's hearing. Hanzo was never humorless, but he was certainly serious, especially in intense situations like this one. And now he just...laughs at the fact that they could have been trapped with a dozen or more hostile guards?

Hanzo hangs the bow and quiver off his arm again and starts climbing.

It's slow but steady, Hanzo putting one hand over the other, shoulders shifting as Genji clings on to them. "You're stronger than you used to be," Genji mutters.

"I would like to think so," Hanzo replies.

He heaves himself up on top of the wall, then flips the rope over the other side and descends. Has to drop the last few feet and on impact he staggers, landing on his ass. Genjis rolls to the ground, feeling a few more shattered pieces fall out of him. 

"I apologize." Hanzo picks him up again with a slight gasp. "Where is your bike?"

Genji pings it. Still right where he left it. "Northwest."

Hanzo trudges through the woods.

The trees pass by on either side, great stoic evergreens with long, fluffy branches that block out what little starlight is left. Genji thinks he can help—hopes—and the lights in his vents glow to life, flickering, illuminating their way. Hanzo grunts, amused. "Useful."

The transmitter is still working, at least, having avoided the shrapnel burst Hanzo put in his stomach. So Genji mumbles directions until the bike appears in the dark, dully reflecting green light on the matte finish. They arrange themselves, Hanzo at the bars and Genji sitting behind him. Hanzo strips his jacket off and uses it to tie Genji's listless arms around his waist.

Genji snorts. "Does this mean you're kidnapping me?"

Hanzo shrugs. "If I must."

Genji starts the ignition with a mental command, and Hanzo leans forward, the bike gliding through the woods, hardly jarring them at all as the stabilizers hiss and whir. The bow and quiver are wedged awkwardly beneath their bodies. "There's a road west of here," Genji says. "Not too far."

They pass through the night, the forest quiet around them. A faint owl-hoot in the distance. Genji's visor descends, and his electronic vision picks the bird out of the dark. It regards them as if affronted, its round green eyes glowing. Sort of like his steam vents. 

He raises his visor again. Too long caged by metal and plastic. The night air rushes past his face, and he wishes he could take a deep breath and feel it pouring into him, feel his ribs fanning on their cartilaginous bases, cool breath rushing down his windpipe. But he doesn't have any of those things anymore. His body doesn't expand or pump or pulse. It idles. The only exception being the synthetic blood pumped through his head, brain, and what's left of his spinal cord, replaced every 3 months or (preferably) less. It isn't enough.

But Genji, resting his cheek against the smooth weatherproof fabric of Hanzo's jacket and feeling the bones and muscle shifting beneath—it's something.

The bike speeds forward, dipping down sideways and back up again as it slips around shrubs, rocks, and trees. After a few minutes Genji asks, "Where are you going?"

"West," Hanzo replies. "Isn't that where the road is?"

"You're not going west, you're going south," Genji tells him. "Turn right."

"I _thought_  I was going west," Hanzo mumbles, and the bike veers sharply right, stabilizers unfolding from the frame.

At last the trees break, a rutted road stretching out to their left and right. Hanzo guides the bike slowly up the bank over the wet grass. "Is there someplace where you can go for repair?"

"Go left. There's an abandoned petrol station. I have a van there."

Mist gushes out behind the bike as they fly down the damp road. The air smells of mud, and Genji hopes it will rain again. It's nice to feel the droplets trickling down what's left of his skin. A factory complex passes to the left, and a resort to the right. There, just up ahead. Genji points and Hanzo slows the bike, pulling it into the petrol station. Droopy grass pokes up through the broken concrete. Hanzo circles around behind the building. 

The black van sits right where Genji left it. The rear doors pop open as Hanzo unties his arms, and he swings his leg over and rises, starts to totter forward. A cool, humid breeze rushes through the blast hole in his right thigh. 

Hanzo comes up beside him. "Let me help."

He lifts Genji into the back of the van. Soft white light glows from the walls. Two long, low storage containers are built into either side, and a trio of mechanical arms wait folded up against the ceiling. "Repair," Genji murmurs.

A muted blue light scans him up and down, and the arms spring to life. One jacks into his spine, the others disengaging his limbs and setting them aside. One storage container flips open, and an arm dives in to retrieve parts. 

Genji hangs, a torso with no arms or legs, little metal fingers diving into him and pulling out burned scraps or bits of debris. His limbs are piled neatly in a corner. Hanzo sits on top of the other storage container, just in front of the open doors.

Genji can't meet his eye.

It's revolting. Yes, this new body saved his life, but it's hardly a _body,_ rather a person-shaped machine welded onto his central nervous system. It isn't _real._  Not that he was particularly attached to his old body, but at least it was _his._ This...someone else made this. 

"You've changed," Hanzo says, voice tinted with amusement.

Genji gazes at the floor. "Yes."

A sigh. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to make light of things. May I ask...what happened that night? After I—after I left?"

"I was rescued by an Overwatch medical unit." Genji shrugs his truncated shoulders. "I don't know how they found me. They kept me alive, but...it had been too long. Many of my organs could not be saved. So they built a body out of metal for me instead."

"Ah. So you are with Overwatch now."

"Yes." Genji looks up. "You have also changed. Did you really hire yourself out to guard an illicit weapons manufacturer?"

Hanzo winces a little. "I admit I did not do as much research into my employer as perhaps I should have."

"What happened to you?" Genji asks. "Why are you hiring yourself out? Why are you in Russia?"

Hanzo shrugs. "I left."

Genji stares at him. The faint sounds of suction inside his stomach, whirring from his pile of limbs in the corner. Crickets chirping through the open doors. "You left...what?"

"The clan," Hanzo clarifies. "Well, to be precise, I fled and then was disowned for abandoning my duty."

_"What?_ Why did you flee?!" Impossible to imagine—Hanzo was so devoted, a perfect heir. And then he—

Hanzo's amusement has faded, his hands crushed together in his lap. "Because of you, Genji."

Genji would flinch were he not hanging suspended in the air. 

"I...I could not make it right with myself. What I did to you. I was in anguish. I thought it would be better after the deed was done, that I would no longer have your presence to remind me of—" He falters, then continues. "Of the brother I loved. But it didn't get better. And then I realized that some things didn't make sense. They told me that night that you stole thirty million yen. And you did, because I asked you and you didn't deny it. And they also told me you did it to spite them. That was easy to believe. You never...got on very well with them."

"Because they hated me," Genji murmurs.

"Yes," Hanzo accedes. "But it seemed reckless, even for you. A new identity, a plane ticket, some money for housing and food and clothes—that might cost ten million yen. Not thirty. Ten million, they might even forgive that. But to steal so much would surely risk retribution. So I investigated."

Genji focuses on the floor, lips pressed together. His cheeks burn with shame. He had not wanted his brother to know. Hanzo already had enough to worry about.

"I found your messages to the doctors," Hanzo says. "It wasn't to spite the elders. It was for surgery. And a hormone graft."

"I couldn't stay like that anymore," Genji whispers. "They would not acknowledge who I was. And I couldn't afford the procedures on my own."

Hanzo leans up against the wall. "The shame was...intolerable. That I had not trusted you. Had listened to the elders instead. But perhaps worse was the shame in knowing you felt you could not trust _me."_

"Hanzo..."

"And I discovered you were right. I was choosing the clan over you. And that—that _misguided_  devotion drove me to kill you. My own brother." He hunches, folding his arms. "So I fled. I could not stay and be reminded of my brother's blood staining my blade. Of the men who were glad to see it there." 

"I am—" Genji begins, before his vision flashes white and his body shivers. 

"Genji? Genji!" Hanzo is there, holding his head up, dark eyes searching his face.

"I'm fine," Genji tells him. "It's just...repairs."

Hanzo's hands are warm and calloused against what little remains of Genji's skin. Human. He releases Genji and steps back, gaze flicking over the stacked limbs in the corner. The blast hole in the right leg is filled with foam to replace the synthetic muscle.

"Now you'll never have what you wanted," Hanzo says quietly.

_At least I'm alive,_  Genji thinks of saying. But it doesn't ring true.

"I am sorry." Hanzo runs a hand over his hair. "You were more important to me than anything. You should have been. If there is any way I can help you—"

"I missed you," Genji blurts out.

Hanzo looks up. Through the open doors there's the gentle hiss of rain drizzling on the surrounding trees. 

"Even after you killed me," Genji continues. "I missed you. I didn't blame you. I thought it was my fault for disappointing you—"

_"Genji—"_

_"—_ and that I had pushed you away and done all that to myself. That it was my fault I was alone. I hate being alone. And I—I am a machine now. I can't go to parties or go out to malls, or even walk down the street. I'm going to be alone and I can't do anything about it. I missed you so much. I wished I could call you and talk to you."

Hanzo shrugs. "Perhaps it would not be so bad for you to walk down the street if there were someone with you."

Genji stares at him; he cringes and adds, "Unless you'd rather I not."

"You seem...happy," Genji says.

"Ah. Well—I apologize if I have been insensitive. I am simply glad to see you alive."

"No, I mean in general. You used to frown all the time." Genji smiles. "Now you won't frighten everyone away when I take you to clubs."

Hanzo snorts. "I don't like clubs. That's why I was always frowning when you took me out."

Genji groans. "Hanzo, clubs are _fun._  And you need to show off this new look. I still—" He starts to giggle. "I still can't believe you got a _bridge piercing._  Did you hit your head while you were fleeing Japan?"

"No! I just..." Hanzo thumbs one silver stud absently. "...wanted to do _something._ Wanted to look different."

"No, it looks good, I like it."

"Hm. _You_  certainly performed more _extravagant_ interventions when we were younger."

Genji cackles. He remembers well the moment he told Hanzo he'd gotten his nipples pierced, the baffled "but—but _why?!"_ And Hanzo is laughing too, head tipped back, like a man without a care in the world.

There's a hazy glow from outside the van.

Genji's visor descends. His heat filter shows perhaps a dozen figures approaching down the road. "It seems they've come after us," he murmurs.

Hanzo is serious again—almost; his lips are still curled in a smile. "Hm. We should run."

"Perhaps, but if we run there'll only be more when they come for us later."

"Damn." Hanzo unships his bow. "I am beginning to wish I hadn't wasted all of those arrows on you." 

"I have a sword." Genji jerks his head at the corner of the van, where the blade leans sheathed.

Hanzo hesitates for the barest second; but then he drops his bow and quiver, snatching up the sword and stripping the sheath. It falls to the floor. Hanzo freezes as the blade gleams naked in his hands, and he looks up, startled. Genji tries to shrug but the jolt a moment ago seems to have disconnected that function. "You left it. It's a good sword."

"You know, I haven't touched a sword in six years." Hanzo smiles wryly. "Let us hope I remember my forms. Is this vehicle bulletproof?"

"Yes. These days I am...well funded."

"Good." He hops out of the van and heaves the doors shut.

Genji lowers his visor again to watch. In the heat filter the sword is invisible but he watches Hanzo give it a few experimental twirls as he backs around the van.

The cluster of orange shapes approach.

Hanzo uses the van to deprive them of sightlines, uses their own comrades to dissuade bullets. Genji recognizes the blade techniques, nowhere near as precise as they used to be—more like his own now, reactive and improvisational, and he grins. So much for all that chastising when they were children. Bullets drum into the sides of the van with a blunted rattle. The mechanical arms pause briefly with each burst to prevent jarring.

Hanzo staggers.

"No," Genji whispers, but then he straightens and fights on. His enemies fall. One by one, mostly by decisive sword-strikes but some jerk, struck by friendly fire. Hanzo moves so quickly and fluidly that it's hard for them to keep a bead on him. But as more of them die, it's harder for him to find human shields.

He flinches, then kills another, holding the body close to him. They were wearing body armor, Genji remembers—no use against the nano-honed blade. It'll stop the bullets, but the last remaining attacker is backing away, heading for their own vehicle. 

Genji puts the van in reverse. It shoots across the uneven parking lot and veers hard left, skidding; the gunman is too slow to react and Genji hears the satisfying _thump_  as the van smashes into them. Hanzo darts forward and finishes the job. 

The mechanical arms resume their work. Genji opens up the doors again and Hanzo climbs in, clutching the back of his shoulder. There's a gash in his thigh too, leaking dark red blood. He grimaces, sucking in air through his teeth.

Pain.

Genji hasn’t felt pain since the days of his reconstruction, misfiring nerves and faulty neural interfaces feeding white-hot shocks of phantom agony to his helpless brain. He misses it. “There is a first aid kit in the container."

Hanzo finds it, limping over, pulling the grey box out with his good arm. The sword he tosses carelessly on the ground. The faint blue sheen is obscured by thick red gore.

"Is it serious?" Genji asks.

"No." Hanzo winces, slipping the jacket off his back.

Genji is quiet, watching Hanzo peel off a sticky strip of wound tape, lay it over the cut on his back, and pull the string to secure it closed. The gash on his thigh he jams with gauze. "A mobile repair station is quite something," he remarks. "If only your first aid kit were so advanced."

Genji chuckles. "I do not have much need for biofilm these days."

"Hm." Hanzo gazes at him for a moment, half a smile on his face. "I suppose my credibility as a blade-for-hire is somewhat ruined now."

"After you break a contract to rescue the man who attacked your employer? I would think so."

"And I don't even know if it was worth the trade." He shrugs. "You could try and kill me the instant you are healed."

"If I wanted you dead, I would have let those gunmen do it."

"How should I know? Perhaps you wish to land the killing blow yourself."

Genji can't maintain his smile. The memory of that rainy night is too intrusive. The moment when Hanzo hacked the sheath from Genji's sword, when the blade was exposed—and the thought of hurting Hanzo was nearly as awful as the fact of Hanzo trying to kill him. "I would never do that," he whispers.

Hanzo is quiet, widening the tear in his pants so he can slide another strip of wound tape inside. "I will not ask for your forgiveness," he starts. "What I did...it should not be—"

"Hanzo, I miss you," Genji interrupts. "Overwatch is always looking for skilled agents. We could offer you steady employment."

Hanzo heaves a sigh, combing his beard with his fingers. "I...do not think I am ready to be part of another organization."

Genji tries to think of what to say. _Please don't leave. I don't want to lose you again._

"How long will these repairs take?" 

Genji blinks. "I will be functional in an hour. But I won't be winning any fights. That will take time."

Hanzo nods, leaning back. "Do you eat?"

"I...can eat. I do not need to."

"Good. I will drive us into the city. I could use a cup of tea."

Genji grins in delight. "Ah—you may want to change your clothes first. There are some in that container. The pants may be a little short."

Hanzo snorts. "A _little?"_

"Yes, a little," Genji shoots back. "I'm four inches taller now."

Hanzo raises his hands in surrender. "My apologies. I was unknowing." He rises, grasping his wounded thigh. Genji lowers the divider to expose the cab, the metal arm in his back rotating to point him forward.

The van starts and the music flickers on as Hanzo sits, upbeat electro pop bubbling out of the speakers. Hanzo grunts. "I can't believe you still listen to this. You're thirty-one."

Genji rolls his eyes. "You need to learn how to have _fun,_  brother. Now that you're free of the clan they can't stop me from showing you how to let loose a little."

"I know how to have fun, Genji. Just like I know your music is terrible." He spins the wheel, guiding the van out onto the road. The machine arms stop and then start again as the van straightens out. 

Genji makes a noise of disgust. "Don't tell me you're still stuck on the notion that any music less than a hundred and fifty years old is trash—"

"It _is_ trash, Genji. It does not stimulate the mind."

"You can't dance to Fauré, Hanzo."

"I have no wish to dance!"

"But I can't go dancing _alone,"_ Genji whines. "What if someone thinks I'm an Omnic and tries to attack me?"

"I am fairly confident you would be able to defend yourself."

Genji lets out a sigh, his shallow vocal sac pulling in air and expelling it over his vocal cords. "I assumed since you got your nose pierced you would be _slightly_  less boring."

"I am offended you would think such things about me."

Genji chuckles at that despite himself. 

"I missed you as well," Hanzo says. "I...do not have the words to express how happy I am you're alive."

"Mm." Genji nods sagely. "I am also happy that I'm alive."

It's a joke but it's true and that's something new—that now he feels as if it's _worth_  it, as if there's something to look forward to. In the front seat Hanzo is sternly ordering the radio to change stations. Genji grins out the windshield at the passing night and can't bring himself to argue.


End file.
